Also the question of whether they're in a party that has any negative healing at all. Like, you can totally bring along your own undead minion, if you like.
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Harm font on a cloistered cleric, tbh, feels a bit like you have a bunch more focus spells. Like, harm has bad scaling for damage in a lot of ways. A single 1d8 per spell rank means that at rank 3, it does the damage of a acid arrow, which is a 2 rank 2 spell, and woefully behind the curve.
However, it is basically Elemental Toss but with a saving throw instead of an attack roll. Viewed in that lense, getting 4 and eventually 6 of these for free with the remaster means you have damage that is higher on the damage curve than cantrips, but can't be replenished like a focus spell. So it's a bit awkward of a design space. But hey, Harming hands can make your damage a d10 instead of d8, which does help punch up the damage a tad if you don't mind sacrificing one of the many very good other feats to get it.
Honestly I think that Warpriests are better able to utilize a harm font better than a cloistered cleric. Channel Smite helps you really get a lot out of a harm font by letting you stack accuracy buffs on yourself, and possibly true strike if you pick the right deity to get it, without needing to worry about dealing with fort saves on tanky creatures.
On a cloistered though, I'd say its a little disappointing but there is absolutely an argument to be made for having some free damage that does more than cantrips on hand.
In a negative healing party a harm font is much more than just a reverse heal font. It's more like a heal font if 90% of your enemies were undead. At the early levels it's the kind of power other casters can only dream of.
In a normal party you have to wait until selective energy to make good use of it, so it's still good but you kinda miss out on the level 1-4 golden age. So I'd probably pick a heal font on a neutral deity and retrain into harmful font at 6.
Yes Harm font just for offensive purpose its just like a weak damage focus spell. They are auto-heightened but it's only 1d8 per rank, you have a good amount but still a daily usage resource, they are emanation requiring that you stay relatively close to the frontline, to prevent friend-fire you need to get a feat just to avoid your allies. So in the end IMO its just better than a cantrip but worse than the most offensive focus spells.
But when your party is full void healing the things changes. Now it not only hurts your enemies as also heal you and your allies, Selective Energy is no more mandatory (but its useful if your opponents are a mix of living and undead creatures) and you still able to use it as 2-action 1d8+8 per rank healing when needed too. As already said by Sy Kerraduess, the same thing also works for healing too if you are in a diablo like campaign (including you can damage fiends with Holy Castigation Divine Castigation).
The edge of harm in a non-healing context is that its minimum damage is really high, so for finishing off enemies it's like a force barrage on steroids.
At level 5 you already can't deal less than 27 damage (13 on a save) to the entire enemy group and you average around 36 on a failed save, while the wizard's fireball next to you will deal a minimum of 6 and average around 18.
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The edge of harm in a non-healing context is that its minimum damage is really high, so for finishing off enemies it's like a force barrage on steroids.
At level 5 you already can't deal less than 27 damage (13 on a save) to the entire enemy group and you average around 36 on a failed save, while the wizard's fireball next to you will deal a minimum of 6 and average around 18.
Can't speak for the re-mastered rules, but the base PF2e version doesn't get the '+8 per spell level' bonus to damage for a two-action cast, so the damage range at 5th level is only 3-24:
' The spell has a range of 30 feet. If you're healing an undead creature, increase the Hit Points restored by 8.'Likewise, the flat bonus is specific to the 2 action version, so the 3 action AoE version doesn't actually get it.
Can't speak for the re-mastered rules, but the base PF2e version doesn't get the '+8 per spell level' bonus to damage for a two-action cast, so the damage range at 5th level is only 3-24:
' The spell has a range of 30 feet. If you're healing an undead creature, increase the Hit Points restored by 8.'Likewise, the flat bonus is specific to the 2 action version, so the 3 action AoE version doesn't actually get it.
Well then... It seems I had two fundamental misunderstandings about the spell. Without the +8 it definitely loses most of its oomph in a non-negative party. So forget my take, as it seems my table was buffing the spell to an absurd degree without realizing it.
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It's a common error but it really does rip just about all the value out of the 3 action version, heal or harm.
I still don't think harm font is worth much outside of a negative healing party though. On a more interesting note though, cast down no longer has the font as a prerequisite so anyone with access to the spell can dip into cleric for it. Or heck, just keep a few archetype harm slots for free KDs. Level 12 off the archetype is regrettable, but it's an option, if nothing else.
Don't forget it will be d10s not d8s.
Channel Smite effectively replaces a melee Strike and single action fortitude save with one extra damage Strike. It is a bit like Power Attack
Just like Power Attack in isolation it doesn't look great. However:
1)Fortitude saves for a lot of brutes and many undead can be very high. Just attacking AC can be a better option. Especially for a War Priest.
2)It is a lot easier to get net modifiers to an AC based attack. Example: offguard/flat footed is an easy 2, Aid can be +2 to +4 and in the remaster it is now clearly an expectation of the designers and available at lower levels.
3)True Strike is available to a number of clerics eg Gorum, Ragathiel
Packing all this together can be very potent.
So is the general consensus that it's best with Cast Down? Or can you do things with the 1-action version or 3-action AoE version?It's a common error but it really does rip just about all the value out of the 3 action version, heal or harm.
I still don't think harm font is worth much outside of a negative healing party though. On a more interesting note though, cast down no longer has the font as a prerequisite so anyone with access to the spell can dip into cleric for it. Or heck, just keep a few archetype harm slots for free KDs. Level 12 off the archetype is regrettable, but it's an option, if nothing else.
Yeah, Cast Down is for sure the harm font's highlight on a cloistered Cleric. I'm in a level 8 party with a harm font Cleric of Groetus/Pharasma and every time that feat gets used on something not immume to the prone condition it feels like watching a demon get one-tapped by the super shotgun in Doom. It's absurdly powerful and most things have no hope of resisting it unless they're much higher level or roll a 20. It's nasty in a party with AoO users.
He had Directed Channel for a while but never used it. For Heal, that feat is kind of sad because cones don't include the caster as opposed to emanations, and its other use case of sniping several enemies with Harm without hitting the party is kind of moot in an undead-heavy campaign. He retrained it into Versatile Font, and has been vastly enjoying the increased utility.
Heal and Harm are simply leagues apart in potency and I don't think most people play in optimized parties where everyone has negative healing, so it's not like it's particularly close either.
Heal and Harm are simply leagues apart in potency and I don't think most people play in optimized parties where everyone has negative healing, so it's not like it's particularly close either.
It depends on your approach to healing. The parties I see tend to be well organised. There is only occasional need for Heal in combat as they have other sources of healing, so typically they only need one Heal prepared. Most healing is done out of combat and daily resources like spell slots are just not required for that. In an undead heavy campaign the Heal is great. But otherwise you may as well try to use your divine font more efficiently.
It depends on your approach to healing. The parties I see tend to be well organised. There is only occasional need for Heal in combat as they have other sources of healing, so typically they only need one Heal prepared. Most healing is done out of combat and daily resources like spell slots are just not required for that. In an undead heavy campaign the Heal is great. But otherwise you may as well try to use your divine font more efficiently.
I play PFS a lot with healers and I see the same thing: Past the first 4 levels the need for healing goes down to one Heal per day on average. That's why I have a very negative point of view on the Cleric class: In my opinion the Font is just overkill.
About Harm, I've been trying to do a Harm based character since day 1 and have never really been able to reach a satisfying build. The Warpriest seems the most obvious choice but then the save DC goes down at some point affecting Harm efficiency (and Channel Smite is a joke considering that it reduces your damage output). Also, the issue of using 1-action Harm repeatedly is the extreme resource cost of the strategy. That's why I consider the Tempest Oracle, with its Harm-like Focus Spell, to be a more sustainable Harm-based build.
I also think it's near mandatory to grab Occult casting for Spectral Hand unless you have a rather tanky character. 120ft range instead of Touch changes everything.